New standard for 340 trillion, trillion, trillion Net addresses: SAN FRANCISCO - THIRTY years after the first In...

There are 340 undecillion IPv6 addresses available. -- PHOTO: AFP SAN FRANCISCO - THIRTY years after the first Internet addresses were created, the supply of addresses officially ran dry on Thursday. But don't panic. The transition to a new version of addresses is already well under way and, for most people, should occur without even being noticed. At a special ceremony in Miami on Thursday, the organisation that oversees the global allocation of Internet addresses distributed the last batch of so-called IPv4 addresses, underscoring the extent to which the Web has become an integral and pervasive part of modern life. Every computer, smartphone and back-end Web server requires an IP address - a unique string of numbers identifying a particular device - in order to be connected to the Internet. The explosion of Web-connected gadgets, and the popularity of websites from Googl...